FIRST LOOK: Cartier re-opens ‘temple’ to jewellery and watches on London’s New Bond Street

Cartier has re-opened its London Flagship on New Bond Street just in time for Christmas, and announced that its smaller second store, 200m south on Old Bond Street, will close for nine months in January for refurbishment.

When the New Bond Street store re-opens in September next year, the two locations will work together to provide a central London showcase for Cartier’s creations across watches, jewellery, fragrance and accessories.

Cartier describes the re-opened New Bond Street boutique as one of three “temples” — the other two being its New York and Paris showrooms — where exceptional objects are bought to life.

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“With the reopening of our New Bond Street boutique, we are putting the spotlight on our incredible history and heritage in London. New Bond Street will sit alongside the other Cartier temples in Paris and New York. The new boutique will delight and surprise our guests and will represent the best of Cartier excellence and client services, mixing tradition and modernity,” says Laurent Feniou, managing director of Cartier UK.

Paris-based architect Bruno Moinard created the interior of the Cartier store, which had to work within the fabric of an historic building.

It now has a second entrance so that shoppers can enter the main ground floor showroom from New Bond Street or Albemarle Street.

The temple analogy is appropriate with the space over several floors designed for quiet contemplation and reverence as much as it is for presenting watches and jewellery in a traditional sense.

Cartier is reserving a number of exclusive timepieces that can only be found in New Bond Street, such as a re-edition of the historical Crash watch in 18ct gold, first created in London in the midst of the swinging sixties, as well as its jewellery version set with brilliant cut diamonds, numbered and limited to 15 pieces.